


With Dirge in Marriage

by queenofthorns



Series: Terra Incognita [3]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-21
Updated: 2013-05-21
Packaged: 2017-12-12 12:28:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/811602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenofthorns/pseuds/queenofthorns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set after episode 3.08; Jaime and Brienne quarrel over Tyrion's wedding. Sequel to <a href="">Terra Incognita</a> and <a href="">Palimpsest</a></p>
            </blockquote>





	With Dirge in Marriage

Brienne feels Jaime moving behind her; the loss of his warmth in the bed leaves a momentary draft down the small of her back before he pulls the covers back over her. She buries her head deeper in the pillow but her hopes of sinking back into sleep are dashed by a familiar voice saying, “Beg pardon, m’lord!”

Brienne rolls over with a grunt, and opens her eyes. Jaime’s sitting up, his back to her, the tension in his shoulders showing he’s not best pleased to be caught unawares. Brienne could have sworn that she bolted and barred the door but then she remembers that she’d only intended to sleep for an hour, no more. Instead, from the pale light seeping through the cracks in the shutters, she judges that she and Jaime have slept for most of a day and all of a night, waking to a new dawn. A pang of hunger is followed by the hollow rumble of her stomach, protesting the meals they’ve missed.

“Beg pardon, m’lady!” Wren nods and grins, noting Brienne’s presence in Jaime’s bed. _Let him look.There is nothing to see._

Jaime looks over his shoulder at Brienne, his mouth quirked briefly in a smile. His skin is no longer flushed, and his eyes are clear. His fever is gone. They’ll continue their journey, and, gods willing, Lady Catelyn’s daughters will soon be reunited with their mother.

“Surely even you Northerners have heard of knocking...” Jaime drawls, turning his attention back to Wren. “It’s a noise you make when you want to enter a room.”

“News from King’s Landing,” Wren blurts out, filled with the excitement of being the first to impart what is undoubtedly bad news. “Riders in the night.”

“What is it?” Brienne asks, her momentary optimism dissipating like a morning mist. Riders in the night mean nothing good in her experience. In her darkest imaginings, she thinks she will wander forever, always searching for but never finding Lady Stark’s vanished daughters.

“The Imp,” Wren begins. “Beggin’ your pardon, ser! Your brother has wed the little princess.”

“That can’t be right,” Jaime says. “Tyrion and Myrcella are ...”

“He's wed King Robb’s sister,” Wren interrupts. “Sansa Stark.”

“Oh,” Brienne says, sinking back into the pillows. _The poor girl_ , she thinks. _The poor, poor girl._ She has never met Sansa Stark, but she remembers well the pain of her own broken betrothals. Brienne’s suitors were a poor lot, though she could read in their eyes that even the meanest of the men who sought her hand for the promise of her inheritance thought her lucky to be wooed by him. Her Septa and most of the maids in the castle agreed with them but thank the Maid and the Mother that Lord Selwyn had not forced her into a loveless marriage with a stranger. She squeezes her eyes shut to stop a sudden onslaught of tears, though whether they are for Sansa Stark or for herself she does not know.

“Out,” she hears Jaime tell Wren. “And next time knock or send someone who knows how. You use your knuckles, not your fists, as you did yesterday.”

Jaime’s steps draw near and she feels his breath as he bends over her. “Brienne?” he asks.

She opens her eyes, which Jaime takes as an invitation to sit beside her. “Say something,” he urges her, but she cannot yet trust her voice not to betray her.

“Is it our vows that trouble you?” he asks, frowning. “I suppose the girl is my good-sister now and we cannot return to her lady mother, but there is another Stark child.”

“Arya.” Brienne sits up too so she’s facing Jaime across the narrow bed.

“Arya,” Jaime nod. “I’ll send her back to her mother with you. Keeping half a vow is better than not keeping it at all. I’m sure the High Septon would agree.” His mouth twists in a bitter smile. “And if not, my father will buy a new High Septon who does.”

Brienne swallows. “It’s not that,” she says, though the thought of failing her mistress is a bitter one, made more bitter if what Lord Bolton told them was true. King Robb held his mother a traitor for exchanging the Kingslayer for both his sisters; what will he do when Brienne returns with only one? Brienne will make sure Lady Stark knows that Sansa’s marriage was none of Jaime’s doing; perhaps it will comfort her and stay her son’s anger to know that Jaime had intended to keep his promises.

“What is it then?” Jaime asks.

“The poor, poor girl,” Brienne begins. “A maid of only fourteen, married against her will to ---”

“A dwarf?” There’s an edge to Jaime’s voice. “Have a care, my lady, when you speak of Tyrion. My brother is clever, kind, brave and for all his small size, handsome too. He will be the Lord of Casterly Rock one day. The girl could do far worse.”

 _It’s no use_ , Brienne thinks. _The eyes of love are blind_. “Your brother is a Lannister,” she says, choosing her words slowly. “Their family is her family’s enemy. They killed her father; they trapped her and held her prisoner, and now they have forced her to marry.”

“ _They_?” Jaime jaw tightens. “I’m a Lannister too, remember?”

Her cheeks grow hot with anger. “Very well,” she says. “ _Your_ family killed Lady Sansa's father and held her captive and far more besides. Do you still think her lucky to marry an enemy?” She looks into his eyes, holding his green gaze and willing him to understand.

He is the first to look away. “Whom do you serve, Brienne?” he asks, the ice in his voice melting.

“I serve Lady Catelyn Stark,” Brienne says. “You know that.”

“And the Starks are enemies of the Lannisters, as you said.”

“Yes,” Brienne says, still bristling. “Their enmity is not without cause.”

“True enough,” Jaime says. “I have given them much cause myself.” He takes a deep breath, looks into her eyes and asks. “You serve Lady Stark, and I am a Lannister. Are we enemies then, Brienne?”

Jaime crippled Catelyn Stark’s child, and tried to goad her into killing him. Brienne would have gladly swung the sword that took his head if Lady Stark had ordered it. _Then_.

She hears her own scornful voice, calling Jaime a monster, a false knight, cruel and careless, who harmed those he’d sworn to protect. And she remembers him, reliving the horrors of Aerys Targaryen’s madness and cruelty, as though they had happened the day before, not eighteen years earlier. It was true enough that Jaime had given Catelyn Stark ample reason to hate him, but it was not the _entire_ truth. A man might be scorned for his dishonor and still be honorable. A man might do monstrous things and yet ... _His lie saved me; he gave his truth to my judgement. He risked his life for mine; he came back for me._

“No,” she says. “I am not your enemy.” Jaime’s taut shoulders relax, but Brienne is not quite finished. “Though Sansa and Tyrion ...”

“May yet come to cherish each other, though one is a Stark and the other a Lannister. Marriages with less auspicious beginnings than theirs have flourished, my lady.”

“Perhaps,” Brienne says, though she thinks this outcome doubtful.

Jaime gives an unexpected snort of laughter. “You’re a terrible liar,” he tells her. “I can see you don’t believe a word I’ve said.” His face sobers. “It may not mean much, but I’ll wager my father is behind this marriage, not Tyrion.”

“What does it matter _why_ your brother has wed Lady Sansa?” Brienne asks. “The result is the same.”

“Why _always_ matters.” Jaime clumsily unravels the bandages on his right arm. “If I'd tried to understand _why_ Locke hated me, I might have stopped talking in time to keep both my hands. Instead, I have this _thing_.” The light of the newly risen sun picks out puckered ridges of skin and neat lines of black threads where his wrist ends.

Unthinking, Brienne reaches out her own right hand and touches her fingers, light as feathers, to his wound. He catches his breath and Brienne jerks her hand back. “Did I hurt you?” she asks.

“No, my lady.” Jaime bows his head. “It’s only that ... I can scarcely look at this stump.” He shudders. “It turns my stomach to touch it. Yet you ..."

 _I am used to imperfect flesh_ , she thinks. _I know it far better than you._

A cascade of knocks is followed by the creak of the door opening. Wren enters, balancing a tray heaped high with bread and cheese and a precarious arrangement of apples.

“Steelshanks is saddling the horses,” he tells them, placing his burden on the table. “I thought you might be hungry, m’lady.”

“Wren,” Jaime says. “You’ve mastered the art of knocking, but there’s another step.”

“Aye, m’lord?”

“You’re supposed to wait outside until someone - such as myself or the Lady Brienne - gives you permission to enter.”

“Aye, m’lord.” Wren gives Brienne a broad wink before he turns to go. “Steelshanks says you have half an hour.”

“Such impertinence,” Jaime says. “I can’t think why you permit it.”

“You’re quite right,” Brienne smiles. “My traveling companions are  _terribly_ impertinent. I can't think why I permit it.”

 


End file.
